DEFENSIVE COORDINATOR ANTHONY CAMPANILE
MEDIA AVAILABILITY
THURSDAY, DECEMBER 4, 2025
(On the modifications that he has made to the defense since the BYE Week) “Not a ton. Not
a ton in terms of making changes, but I think whenever you get to the BYE Week, you get a
chance to do that. You get a chance to really kind of quality control and see what’s been
good. And honestly, what’s been called, sometimes you’re practicing stuff and you’re
looking at it and saying, alright, we really this. Maybe you don’t get to it in the game. This
situation doesn’t present itself, so sometimes you can kind of pair things down. And I think
that’s something that has helped our guys. We’ve done that a little bit, and I think the guys
have done a good job with it.”
(On if he evaluates how to call the defense throughout the season) “Yeah, for sure. Every
year I say this a lot, but this season’s so long, you’re going to have different stuff that you
do. And there’s some stuff that makes it, there’s so many great ideas and anytime you’re
with a bunch of guys who have been around, and we’ve got a bunch of coaches who have
been around or really good football coaches in that room, they have a lot of great ideas, our
assistant coaches. So, what makes it into the game plan? What you end up keeping, that’s
always a hard decision. But as the season goes, you kind of figure out who you are as a
defense and you really gravitate more to the skill set of the players, what they do well, and
putting them in those positions where you could play fast and be most successful as a
defense.”
(On what has changed to allow DE Josh Hines-Allen to generate more sacks) “Just certain
stuff that we’re doing probably with groupings, maybe even rotation of guys and stuff, that’s
been a little bit different. But yeah, really we haven’t changed a whole lot, but I think as
things are going and like anything else, when you’re doing things over and over and over
again now you get to this point in the season, I think guys are very comfortable with what
they’ve been doing. You’ve been working the same techniques or running the same games
or whatever it may be. It really simplifies for guys.”
(On moving DE Josh Hines-Allen to different rushing sides) “We’ve tried to do that. We’ve
done that a little bit. Moved him around, moved some other guys around. And I think that
gives us some versatility in the rush and trying to manipulate matchups as best we can with
certain different points in the game. But the guys have done a really good job in the four-
man rush especially. So they really kind of – when I refer to the pass rush, I just think it’s
more so about our guys, the detail they’ve been practicing with. Just being downstairs with
them in the meeting room, they’re so dialed in and I think we’re really picking up there and
doing a good job of that over the last few weeks.”
(On if Hines-Allen will still move around with DE Travon Walker back from injury) “That’s a
good question. Certainly, a lot of ideas that float around and Tra gives you more versatility
too and I think Dennis [LB Dennis Gardeck] has done a great job. I think some of the young
guys have done a great job. And guys, even stepping in last week for Arik [DT Arik
Armstead], I thought Smoot [DE Dawuane Smoot] did a great job too. So, we feel good
about all those guys in there and the versatility that they have to move around in the front.”
(On if Colts WR Alec Pierce is a deep or quick game threat) “Some of both. He’s some of
both, but he really can run, he’s generated a lot of big plays down the field for them. I think
they do a great job of trying to get him isolated and for one, stretch the defense with him.
He’s an impressive guy because like I said, not only can he run, but he’s a bigger target for
them. And he has done a really good job for them the whole year.”
(On getting S Eric Murray back) “Eric’s a great leader and I’ve said before, he is a great
communicator. Anytime you get a guy like that, that has that veteran presence, the
toughness that he brings to the game, he’s a physical guy. He’s tackled his ass off this year.
He has done a great job being physical in the middle of the field and really separating guys
from the football. So, I love that about his game. I love when he’s out there because like I
said, he’s always bringing an edge to us, and he is a great communicator back there.”
(On Colts TE Tyler Warren) “Yeah, we seem to be getting a lot of these tight ends that are
good players, but that’s kind of the in-vogue thing in the league and he’s another one who’s
really super talented, can do a lot of things for them. They use him in a myriad of different
ways. He’s in the backfield, he’s out there at receiver, he is in at the tight end hole, and he’s
really done a great job for them this year. I think, he’s really got all the skills that you’re
looking for in a tight end, physical on the line of scrimmage, like I said, they’ll move him
around, isolation block with him and they’ll get him down the field as well. So, he’s
definitely a guy you’ve got to know where he is at.”
(On ‘Jaguars DNA’ and how they show up on Sundays) “Being tough and being team first, I
think those are things that I think about right away. Being a great teammate and a lot of that
– you asked about the pass rush earlier you guys had asked about that. I think there’s a
certain selflessness, when you’re selfless in the rush, there’s a team-rush mentality and
executing the plan. I think the guys have done that. They want to see each other’s success.
That gets them excited, so when we talk about Jaguar’s DNA, being physically and mentally
tough, loving your teammates and trying to be a great teammate. Those are the things that
come to mind for me.”
(On what makes DT DaVon Hamilton a good run defender) “Honestly, like I just said,
extremely selfless. He’s a guy that if you really value defensive line play and you love to
watch D-linemen work in the run game and transition in the pass game, he’s about as good
as I’ve been around. He’s such a great teammate, that guy. He’s a tough dude, he plays
through it all the time, plays through everything. You look at the other day, he jumped in at
long snapper, so one of the great two-way players in the league, obviously right now
(laughs). But no, you watch him in there and he’ll play zero-nose, he’ll play shade, we move
him around, but grinding blocks and tearing off blocks, not staying blocked. He’s a big guy
obviously, but he does not stay blocked, and he does a great job splitting double teams and
he keeps people clean in the run game. So, he’s a huge part of everything we do.”
(On if he was hoping to get a comment in about Hamilton’s long snapping) “Hoping to get
that in. Yeah, he is man (laughs). He is like [Pro Football Hall of Famer] Chuck Bednarik. The
guy is.”
(On if the Colts have the best run game the team has faced this year) “Yeah, they’re very
good. Obviously, the running back is explosive, but he’s also explosive because he doesn’t
go down easy, now. He’s not a guy that you can arm tackle. It’s got to be a team tackling
mentality with him. He’s a physical back and they’re physical in the front, they’ve got guys
that finish blocks. When you have that many explosive or long runs, it’s because guys in the
front are finishing blocks. They do that on the perimeter, they do that in the front, so that’s
something we’ve got to do. We’ve got to stay after it, do a great job with our eyes. They
challenge it with all the schemes that they run in the run game. They probably have the
most multiple run game of anybody we played in terms of scheme variation, motion, pre-
snap they do a great job of it. And I think they’ve done a great job offensively with their run
game and matching up and marrying their play action pass game to that. But yeah, that’s
definitely the challenge this week because he is a great back and they got a great front.”
OFFENSIVE COORDINATOR GRANT UDINSKI
MEDIA AVAILABILITY
THURSDAY, DECEMBER 4, 2025
(On the challenge of inserting different pieces into the offensive line) “It’s definitely a
challenge. Those guys have embraced that. It is tough though because you get later in the
year, you’re going to have less and less practice reps. You have only so many days in full
pads and then even the days when you’re not in full pads, you can’t always get out there
and truly get practice reps, can’t go full speed because guys get banged up. It’s the nature
of the beast a little bit at this point in the season. So, you start to try to work a guy Wyatt [OL
Wyatt Milum] in at guard, at tackle, and he’s playing both sides, got to be ready to play
multiple positions. Because when a guy’s your seventh or eighth lineman, they can’t just
say I’m the backup right guard and only the right guard. They’ve got to be the backup right
guard, backup left tackle and backup left guard. So, you go into the week and you know I
might only have a couple of reps during the week. Where do I take those reps? Do I take all
three at right guard? Do I take one at left tackle? So you get in situations like that where
thankfully Wyatt had gotten some reps in that situation, but you’re kind of banking on the
whole body of work over the whole offseason, the whole training camp, even during the
spring of those guys being in meetings together, being out there at practice together
because there’s things in that game plan, plays in that game plan, that they may never have
done together. So, it’s a challenge to be able to go out there and do it in full speed when it’s
a play you’ve only walked through or only talked about in a meeting, but I love their
approach to it.”
(On how to prepare for a defense like the Colts with multiple different looks) “Well, that’s
another thing, that is a challenge is with limited reps, you have to have rules to the offense,
to your system. And you have to kind of rely on things that you’ve practiced over the course
of the year. You know that not only you need to have a plan for everything they’ve done, but
you know that they’re going to have something new that they haven’t done. They’re going to
game plan something to attack us. Our protection schemes, our routes, our concepts, our
run game. So, you kind of have to take a principles-first approach and say, what are we
trying to do? What are they trying to do from a broader view? And then how can we
conceptualize this to let the guys still go out there and play fast where they’re not paralyzed
by 5,000 different rules of 5,000 different looks? They do a great job of scheming things up,
being creative, attacking all those different things. So, it’s a great challenge for us to
simplify things back down and let our players go play.”
(On the kind of player that WR Brian Thomas Jr. is and his block for WR Jakobi Meyer’s 50-
yard catch-and-run) “It means a lot, and I know it means a lot to me personally. It means a
lot to the guys in the room, and it means a lot to him to go out there and prove that he’s that
type of player, he’s bought in. It’s one of those things where you love the touchdowns, you
love the catches, you love the big plays and that was a huge play. But those types of plays
are plays you look back on, and you feel that’s representative of the identity of our offense
and that’s representative of his identity as a player. So, there’s so much in just that play that
doesn’t show up. We always talk about the stat sheet. There are all these different plays
and things that don’t show up on the stat sheet that show up on tape and that means so
much. A play like that is so special. We talked about the [RB] LeQuint Allen [Jr.], some of
those plays earlier in the year, that’s right up there with the type of things that damn near
bring a tear to your eye as you’re watching that.”
(On how to prevent overanalyzing a defense) “Yeah, that’s a challenge you face really at the
end of the season it starts to become a big challenge because there is so much tape to go
through. But it’s kind of one of those challenges you face all year because most of these
coordinators you’re playing against had been coordinators last year or two years ago, or in
this case for a long history all the way before that. So, you have a library and a body of work
that you can study and basically drown yourself in data. So, you try to pull out once again
the main principles, the concepts, the things that are issues for you and hope that your
rules and your system can handle everything else. So, you might not get to go over every
pressure that they’ve done with the players since 2021 or even since Week 1. You might not
get to show them every single blitz that they’ve shown, but if you have good rules and you
have a system and a foundation that the guys can rely on, then you trust in that, that it can
handle different things, pressures, fronts, run schemes, things that.”
(On how the Colts may adjust the protection scheme with CB Sauce Gardner out) “Well,
there’s certainly always an adjustment when you have an injury, but I think it’s pretty rare for
an offense or a defense to totally scrap an identity. So, if a team is playing man coverage
and they lose a guy who was a great man defender, they still had four other guys on the field
who were really high level at executing man coverage. Same thing, when you have zone
guys and different guys who are great pressure players or different rushers. They’ve lost a
great rusher, but they still can run some of those same pressures or same rush patterns
that they were running when Buckner [DT DeForest Buckner] was in there. So, you don’t
lose kind of the identity. I think that you kind of make adjustments typically. Now,
everybody’s different. So, it’s kind of week to week based on the game plan. How much do
you need to adjust based on missing that guy? It’s the same thing for us when you miss a
wide out. Some games you may have heavily relied on that guy because the matchups
presented themselves favorably for that guy, and then some weeks you kind of move along
business as usual because running your normal core plays or running things within the flow
of the game, you don’t need to change. So, it is a little bit week to week, but I don’t think you
ever really totally stray from the identity of an offense or defense.”
(On what he learned working with QB Daniel Jones last year) “I think it was evident pretty
immediately. You talk about a guy who’s talented in pretty much all aspects of what you’re
looking for in a quarterback where it’s mental processing, physical ability and then the ball
coming out of his hands, can make every single throw all over the field. You add on top of
that getting to be around him, what an unbelievable person he is. His work ethic, the guy he
is in the locker room with the teammates, the camaraderie, the relationships that he builds
with the guys. I don’t have enough positive things to say about Daniel Jones, the way he
works. So, it’s easy for me to say now hindsight. I’m a little bit biased, but no surprise to me
at all the type of success he’s had.”
(On what he learned about OL Cole Van Lanen when first meeting him) “You certainly got to
know by talking to him, getting to know him, that he would be willing to do what we needed.
He’s one of those guys that whatever you ask, he’s going to attack it with his absolute
maximum effort. But there’s a lot of guys that are willing and able to try those things. But for
him to actually go out there and do it in a game and move from right to left, we talked about
doing it from a week-to-week basis and say, last week you were playing left tackle and now
you’re playing right guard. But to do that within a game is truly exceptional. So not only is it
exceptional physically, but exceptional mentally to know how we’re hitting combinations at
left tackle, not only left versus right, but outside versus inside. What are the calls out there?
What are the looks we’re getting? It’s different fronts, totally different surfaces. Now I’m
working with tight ends and I’m not working with the center and a guard. So, for him to do
that and to continue to kind of do it week to week is a testament to his preparation, his work
ethic.”
